Avoidance
by corvusdraconis
Summary: [HG/SS] AU/Crackfic. Neville created something borderline genius in potions class that changes the very course of history—literally. (COMPLETE)
1. Chapter 1

**Summary: ** [HG/SS] AU/Crackfic. Neville created something borderline genius in potions class that changes the very course of history—literally.

**A/N:** Trying to shake a cold and work 12 hour shifts + Aunt Flo = Hell on Earth. Just saying…

**Beta Love:** I just might be publishing unsupervised… nope. The Dragon and the Rose caught me. Dang she's good.

**Avoidance**

"_A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."_

**Saul Bellow - To Jerusalem and Back**

Snape realised he was truly Merlin's gift to the term "bastard" much too late as the thick, cloying fumes of Neville Longbottom's disastrous potion dissipated, and Hermione Granger was gone.

He knew _exactly _where she had gone.

His fault.

His fault for terrorising Longbottom into botching his potion so epically.

His fault.

"_You'll remember me, won't you Severus?" Her hand had closed over his as he pulled her into an embrace. _

"_Always," he had replied. "I could never forget you. Ever. Besides—" He tucked her against his chest, closing his eyes. "You haven't disappeared in seven years. You won't. You're here to stay."_

_Hermione's eyes watered as she looked into his eyes. "That life— it was __**real**__, Severus. I know it was. What if takes me back? What if— you're not there when I go back?"_

"_If you go back, and you won't," he said, cupping her face with his hands. "I'll be waiting for you. I'll be there."_

"_I'm frightened," Hermione whispered. "I don't want to go back to a world without you. What if it's a different world? What if you're dead? What if I was somehow born wrong? What if—"_

_He kissed her forehead. "I will cross hell and high water to be at your side, Hermione. I __**swear **__it."_

"_But—"_

_Severus kissed her soundly, silencing her chain of what-ifs. "We're going to get married. We're going to be happy. We're going to have that cottage by the sea. Otters. Gardens. Everything you've dreamed of."_

"_But Lily said—"_

"_**Damn**_ _what Lily said," Severus cursed. He brushed her hair back with one hand. "She's wrong. I would never hurt you. You know this."_

"_I know," she whispered, clinging to his black robes. "That's the one thing I know for sure is you."_

"_Then you're the only one," he said sombrely. "Even Lily believes I'm evil. Dark. Irredeemable."_

"_You __**are **__Dark, Severus," Hermione said, placing a finger to his lips. "But we are all painted in shades of grey. We are all Dark just as much as we are Light. As long as you never lose sight of yourself in either, there is nothing wrong with being that way."_

"_We'll fight this war together," he promised. _

_Hermione looked haunted. _

"_Fly with me," he whispered, his warm black eyes meeting hers. _

_Her whisky-hued eyes brightened along with her smile. Eager, joyous. "You did it!"_

"_For you."_

_Unshed tears filled her eyes. "Take me with you."_

_He embraced her tightly before stepping back. "I would never leave you behind. Ever."_

_His form shimmered and flowed into that of an ebony Thestral. He keened a long mournful note, rearing up before he bowed low enough to allow her to mount._

_Hermione climbed on his back, hugging his neck tightly as she placed her head against his warm skin._

_Her heartbeat pulsed against his neck as he leapt into the air, carrying her to the skies. _

"_I love you," she whispered against his skin. "I believe in you."_

_Severus crooned a whale-like song as he flew up high into the clouds, revelling in the freedom of wings with the one witch who had become everything._

Severus closed his eyes, his fists tightening as he realised that the young Hermione Granger that had just disappeared hadn't just been a mere doppelganger sent back to mock his pain and suffering.

It hadn't been life rubbing salt in his wounds like inflicting him with Potter's son wearing James Bloody Potter's face and Lily's haunting green eyes—

It had been _her_.

His Hermione.

His bossy, bushy-haired, beautiful, brilliant, tenderhearted Hermione.

"_Won't you be my friend?" Her eyes were like cognac in the bottle, flickering like the sun behind the glass._

"_Why would I want to be friends with you?" he had asked, his lip curling._

"_Because you need a friend, and so do I."_

"_I don't need a friend," he said bitterly._

_She sat down beside him, opening her book._

"_What the hell are you doing?"_

"_Reading."_

_His face turned red. "Why are you doing it here?!"_

"_I like this tree."_

_Severus tried to think up a response, but his brain refused to come up with anything but an imaginary negative number that couldn't possibly exist._

_He clenched his teeth and opened his own book to read, trying valiantly to hold on to his disgust and his anger and his loneliness._

_But his heart fluttered slightly as this bushy-haired she-demon just chose to sit by him and share his space only a mere breath after offering her friendship._

Severus trembled at the memory. He ran his wand over the speckles of what looked like tiny grains of glowing sand around Neville Longbottom's cauldron.

"Where did you _get _this?" Snape hissed dangerously at Longbottom.

The young boy trembled so violently, and then he just passed out cold on the floor.

Time sand.

Neville Longbottom had, somehow, accidentally created time sand.

"_I really don't know how I got here," Hermione said, staring out over Black Lake. "I was in class, I think—it was potions. I hardly knew anyone there. I was partnered with a shy boy. Before very long, everything went pear-shaped."_

It would have been an indisputable genius on his part had Longbottom actually managed it _ON_ _PURPOSE._

"_I don't trust her!" Lily hissed furiously. "You shouldn't either!"_

"_She's in your own reputedly beyond reproach house, Lily."_

"_She's always in the library. She never socialises with us!"_

"_Because you push her out!"_

"_That's not true!"_

Severus unceremoniously yanked Longbottom up by the collar and swept from the classroom. "Class dismissed! I want three feet of parchment on the properties and usage of time sand on my desk at our next class, or you'll all be serving detention with Mr Filch."

Snape stormed up to the Headmaster's office and practically flung the still-unconscious Longbottom boy over Albus' desk. "This bloody little imbecile just blew up his classmate!"

Albus' blue eyes grew very wide, but then they flicked over to Severus' white knuckles and the red skin under his almost all-concealing black cravat. "Severus? Who was hurt? Did you take them to the infirmary?"

Snape threw his palms down on the desk as he hissed through bared yellow teeth at the elderly Headmaster. "Don't you understand, Albus? There was no one _**left **_to take to the infirmary!"

Albus frowned, standing. "_What?"_

Snape glowered at Albus meaningfully.

Dumbledore's face suddenly paled. "Hermione Malfoy?"

"_From this point on, Hermione is my sister. We've adopted her. She is, by the Old Ways, now of our blood. She is as much a Malfoy as I. If any of you dare to raise a wand or hand to her, I will personally see to it that you spend the remainder of your pitiful lives in the most painful manner possible where no amount of money or influence will save you or your family," Lucius snarled through bared teeth, his knuckles white as he flung Goyle bodily into the curtains with his magic and a swift gesture of his hand._

"_Just because the witch saved you from old Abraxas doesn't mean— __**HRK!**_"

_Lucius' hand closed tightly around Crabbe's throat as he pinned him against the portrait of Salazar Slytherin. "She saved me from my wretched bastard of a father, you son of a motherless goat! How many of YOU would have the mettle to stand up to your own sire? Hrm? At the age of twelve? HRM?!"_

_The throng of purebloods quivered in fear against the sheer ferocity of the Prince of Slytherin's ire. None dared to speak._

"_But, she's a bloody Gryffindor!" one of other wizards protested, only to find many sets of eyes staring incredulously at him as an infuriated Lucius' face came dangerously close to his._

"_You insult my mother's pride in her beloved daughter?"_

"_Nuh-no, Merlin no, Lucius!" the wizard stammered, practically pissing his trousers in fright._

"_As long as we have an understanding," Lucius growled, his voice terribly quiet over the layers of unmistakable threat._

_Severus stood silently in the dark near the fireplace as he realised his friend had single-handedly cowed the whole of Slytherin by having turned Lucius' irate, rampaging father into a blond gerbil after the infamous wizard had decked her in the halls of Hogwarts for daring to stand up for Lucius._

_A gerbil that was "accidentally" eaten by one of the school owls._

_Or maybe shared between a few of them._

_No one was quite sure—_

_Everyone knew that Abraxas Malfoy was a right piece of work, and that he would pick a fault of the week and make Lucius pay dearly for it until it stopped amusing him. No one had ever dared stand up to him— _

_Until the day Hermione had quite literally fallen out of the sky to land squarely on top of Abraxas as he slammed his teenage son hard against the castle wall and pressed his jewel-encrusted walking cane into the younger wizard's throat—_

Severus stared into Albus' eyes, fulling aware that the older wizard would not be able to resist rifling through his memories like one would a filing cabinet. The only difference between him and the Dark Lord was that Albus wouldn't Crucio him at the same time.

And Snape wanted the old man to see the memories.

"_Save her, please, you must save her!" Severus pleaded._

"_I'm afraid I cannot, Severus," Albus has said. "She was a fugitive from time. The Ministry was well within its rights to take her away before more damage to the timeline was done."_

"_She had done nothing!" Severus cried in anguish. "Nothing!"_

"_Have you thought that perhaps her meeting you was never supposed to happen?" the Headmaster asked._

_Snape paled. "What?"_

"_Things must be set to rights, or she will never leave Azkaban," Albus said. "I'm so sorry, my boy."_

"_What do you __**mean **__set to right?" Severus demanded, his black eyes filled with despair as his hand fiddled with the ring in his robe pocket— the antique silver and sapphire ring meant for Hermione's finger._

"_I'm sorry, Severus, but no one must remember Hermione Malfoy until her original time."_

_Severus had turned his back to the Headmaster only to spin back around—_

_A flash of light took him straight to the head._

"_I'm truly sorry, Severus."_

_Severus lay on the ground, staring blankly up at the darkening sky as the Ministry Obliviators surrounded him—_

Severus used his arms to fling all of the Headmaster's things off his desk with a resounding crash. "You— you stole the _**only**_ good thing in my _**life**_, Albus!"

Fawkes let out a startled squawk and quickly flew out the window.

"You made me think that bloody bitch Lily was the sole focus of my devotion for all these years! My loyalty. My _**GUILT! **_My _**pain!"**_

"It _**had **_to be done!" Albus argued. "The timeline _**had **_to be repaired!"

"And how do you know that wasn't the way it was _**SUPPOSED**_ to be, you meddling old bastard?! Something _**better! **_Something incredibly beautiful and _**genuine?!**_"

Severus tore at his hair in frustration and pain. "I _**loved **_her, and she loved me. Where is your so-called greater good in letting her be torn from my embrace on the very night I was to propose— screaming—begging—pleading for me to _**help **_her!"

"It wasn't her time, my boy. You _**know **_that."

"She. Saved. Us," Severus snarled. "There isn't one single Slytherin, bookish Ravenclaw, or shy Hufflepuff that didn't thrive more and all because of _**HER!**_"

"That wasn't how it was _**supposed **_to be! She didn't _**belong **_here, Severus!" Albus shouted.

"How _**dare **_you presume to know?!"

Albus was silent.

"_**HOW!"**_

"A prophecy," Albus sighed, his voice a bare whisper.

Severus face shifted into a dangerously emotionless expression. "Whose, Albus?"

Albus flinched, looking at his globe across the room.

"_**WHOSE!"**_

"It won't help—"

Snape's face twisted suddenly, displaying an inhuman baring of teeth. "Who. Made. The. Prophecy? And don't tell me it was sodding Trelawney, as we _**both **_know she can't be trusted to make a prophecy about what the house elves will prepare for breakfast in the morning."

"It was Lily Evans."

Severus' knuckles popped as he clenched his hands tightly. "You trusted the prophecy of an adolescent girl whose insane jealousy of Hermione was well-known to _**everyone**_ in this school?"

His lips pressed into a firm line. "I'm not the only one who is going to remember her now, Albus," Snape bit out, his threat entirely unconcealed. "Lucius Malfoy is going to remember that he had a little sister. Alastor Moody is going to remember his brilliant young apprentice. Minerva is going to remember to whom she taught Animagus lessons on Saturday evenings. Alice and Frank Longbottom should have been attending my wedding instead of getting tortured to death on that terrible night. Nearly every single Death Eater is going to remember that they owe a Life Debt to a certain bushy-haired little witch— and _**you**_, Albus—"

Snape's venom dripped. "I hope you _**burn**_."

Snape whirled and stormed from the Headmaster's office just as Neville Longbottom came to and promptly passed out again in fright.

Phineas Nigellus crossed his arms in his portrait frame and glowered darkly at Dumbledore. "If that Mudblood Evans chit was still alive, she'd be quite dead very soon, _boy_."

"And why would _you _show any concern for a Muggleborn witch, Phineas?" Albus snapped at the portrait.

Phineas Black scowled. "You know as well as I that a magic-sealed adoption ritual spans the web, Albus. All the strands, all the incarnations. She is Hermione Malfoy— _forever_. Slayer of abusive family patriarchs. Saviour of Slytherin House. Champion of the abandoned and forgotten. A golden Gryffindor with a fine coat of scales. When you let your foolish desire to protect that ridiculous Evans chit for the prophecy of a future Potter son and a Dark Lord's supposed demise rule your thinking, you stole away the one who held sway over the bulk of those who fled to hoist Tom Riddle's banner. This is all _your _doing, Albus."

Black sneered at Dumbledore. "You _disgust _me."

"Leave me alone, Phineas. Now."

The elder Black stiffened. "Your wish is my command, Headmaster," he said coldly and left his frame in a contemptuous swirl of painted black robes.

One by one, the other portraits silently left their frames, leaving the Headmaster alone with only Neville Longbottom's unconscious form for company.

* * *

_**Board of Governors Suspend Headmaster Albus Dumbledore While He Remains Under Investigation For Illegal Imprisonment of the Missing Malfoy Heiress**_

_Memories are very strange things, ladies and gentlewizards, and there are no laws more harsh and unforgiving than the ones which punish those who would tamper with them for their own selfish ends._

_Almost overnight, all memories of a once well-known and beloved young heiress of the Malfoy family, simply vanished._

_Owls upon owls came flooding in to the DMLE from various sources, all reporting the same thing: Hermione Malfoy._

_While under investigation for her mysterious disappearance, none other than Headmaster Albus Dumbledore stated that Hermione Malfoy was taken away due to a terrible crime of a highly sensitive nature— a crime he has steadfastly refused to speak of._

_A search of Azkaban and every other known Wizarding prison in the world, however, has not resulted in the discovery of the whereabouts of the lost Malfoy witch._

_Inquiry to Albus Dumbledore has met with failure, evasion, and claims that Hermione Malfoy was an imposter._

_He has been suspending, pending trial, as the investigation proceeds to trial. _

_Lucius Malfoy, who has since remembered his younger sister, accuses Mr Dumbledore of having caused his lady mother to die of grief, due to constant pining for "a daughter" that she could not even put a name to._

_To increase the level of strangeness in this tale, dear readers, we must also add that Hogwarts student Neville Longbottom has reportedly turned himself in for having "blown up Hermione" despite the Headmaster's vehement protests that all students are well-protected at Hogwarts. _

_Investigations are underway as to if the two Hermiones are connected in some way and if, somehow, Mr Longbottom's unfortunate accident in the potions classroom set into motion a tangled chain of events that spans a number of decades in the past._

_Seeing as Mr Longbottom is a minor, and his fellow student was also one at the time of her supposed displacement, if this is confirmed to be true, neither will be held accountable for unintentional time-tampering due to the nature of the accident. _

_Many supporters and conspiracists of Hermione Malfoy, who many believe to be the true Hermione, speculate that everything went to pot after the young witch disappeared, and not before or during her short life._

"_I'm betting that little Muggle tart, Lily Evans, did away with her!" former Ravenclaw Olivia Green said to our reporters. "She hated Hermione Malfoy. Everyone knew that. She hated how people saw her as being such a champion of the underdog. People liked Hermione, and that took attention away from her!"_

While all the investigations are still ongoing, many are clamoring for the use of Veritaserum on Mr Dumbledore, but without proof of Hermione Malfoy's true status, any use of the serum is, unfortunately, unwarranted.

* * *

"There is no bloody _**way **_that girl was a sodding Malfoy," Ron blurted in protest, spitting out a bit of chicken wing, earning groans of disgust from his tablemates.

"The pictures don't lie, mate," Harry said, frowning. "They look just like her. The first ones, I mean. Only the other ones show she grew up."

"Well it's obviously not _**HER**_ then," Ron justified smugly, still eating.

Seamus, hastily schooching over in his seat to avoid being spat upon, frowned. "We were all there when Neville blew her up, and Snape made us write three feet about time sand. He obviously _**knew **_what had happened!"

"That's sodding Snape for you! What does _**he **_know other than how to be bloody terrifying?" Ron shuddered.

"They grew up together, yeah?" Dean whispered. "Hermione and Snape. They were going to be married."

"No _**way**_," Ron garbled, his mouth half-full of toasted cheese sandwich.

Fred and George promptly smacked Ron upside the head from both sides, causing him to launch what was in his mouth clear across the room. "You're bloody disgusting, baby bro. Stop eating like you never had a decent meal in your life, yeah?"

Ron, who had shoved several spoonfuls of strawberry jelly cubes into his mouth already, muttered, "Wot? Mum _**never **_made stuff like this."

"Department of Mysteries says I somehow created a time paradox," Neville said, staring into his glass of pumpkin juice. "I accidentally sent her back in time, creating a past that relied on her having been sent back in time."

"Whaa?" Lavender boggled, her eyes going very wide.

"Neville here was _meant _to botch that potion, Lav," Pavarti explained. "It was fate. You remember what we read in that old Divination book in the library?"

Lavender shook her head. "I guess, but it was an accident."

"That was meant to happen."

"Yeah, like Ronniekins here choking to death," Fred snorted as he saved his brother yet again from choking on food yet again.

"Bound to happen," George agreed. "I think he may have some kind of food compulsion."

"No _**way **_that little bushy-haired monster is actually a Malfoy," Ron reaffirmed, scoffing loudly. "She's way too annoying."

"I could think of someone who's _way _more annoying than her," Harry muttered half under his breath as he took a swig of his pumpkin juice, causing Seamus and Dean to snigger quietly into their own glasses.

Harry looked sullen for a moment, then he sat back, sighing deeply in clear disappointment. "Figures that the very first thing I hear about my mum is that she probably went and offed her main rival."

"No _**way **_your mum had any real competition from 'ermione! With all that mad hair and buck teeth?" Ron blurted, cackling loudly.

"Will you _**please **_stop talking, Ronald?!" Percy finally snapped, slamming his fist down on the table and sending a large tureen of tomato soup spilling over into his youngest brother's lap.

Ron immediately pelted screaming out of the Great Hall, causing many of the students to send up a cheer before going back to their now considerably quieter afternoon meal.

Fred put a brotherly arm around Harry's shoulders. "Don't be so hard on yourself, Harry. We're not our parents, yeah?"

Harry nodded once, manfully trying to cheer up. He looked up at the Head Table to see Snape scowling but for once not at him. "I feel pretty bad for him."

Harry stared into his juice. "He had a happy future ahead of him, and my mum took it all away."

"You really don't know for sure that your mum actually did anything, mate," George tried to placate.

Harry just shook his head. "I know her sister, my Aunt Petunia," he said grimly. "Believe me, it's not too hard to imagine."

* * *

"You brought me here to look in a mirror?" Snape asked Phineas, his dark brows furrowing in annoyance. "Sure the ambiance is suitably Slytherin, but—"

"It's not just any mirror, boy," Phineas chided. "It's the Mirror of Erised."

"So, a _fancy _mirror."

The elder Headmaster wrinkled his painted nose. "Your snark is utterly wasted on me, young man. Instead of lashing out at me, why don't you take a look inside now that the time wards are gone along with the geas that kept me from saying anything."

That startled the potions master. He blinked and took a step towards the mirror—

And gasped.

A bushy-haired witch stood in front of him, her eyes closed as if asleep. Her all-too-familiar nigh-sentient curls moved about her head in a honey-blonde halo around her Malfoy-pale skin.

She looked not a day older than he remembered her.

The reflection— _his_ reflection— was much younger too.

His old self, full of the promise of a happy future.

Younger.

Hopeful.

Devoted.

In _love_.

So much in love.

"_Of course you can marry my sister, you sodding idiot," Lucius had almost yelled at him. "I'm __**not **__telling you you can't marry her! I'm telling you that you can't propose to her without a proper sodding ring or my lady mother will murder us both!"_

Severus closed his eyes.

Her presence was tangible.

He felt himself wrapping his arms around her, the touch of her silken skin, the warmth of her body, the tickle of her fragrant curls against his nose. He could feel her pulse— the thrum of life that had become so painfully a part of him that its absence had left him totally bereft without knowing why.

All those years, he had believed it was because Lily was dead.

"Hermione," he whispered, feeling the tears slide down his nose.

He tightened his embrace, the cruel illusion of her being there in his arms was so strong, so powerful.

"_Severus,"_ Hermione's voice whispered, sleepy, slowly awakening.

Snape's eyes shot open as he found her in his arms—

Real.

_Real!_

_**REAL!**_

He looked to the mirror and it was just a reflection— a younger, very baffled-looking reflection.

Hermione's hand touched his cheek. "Was I sleeping, love? Why do you look so sad?"

Snape let out a choked sob as he crushed her to him. "Hermione!"

She wrapped her arms around him. "Last I checked," she whispered, chuckling softly. "I had such odd dreams. Nightmares."

"I'm here now," he said, stroking her hair with his hand.

"Silly," she chided. "You've _always _been here for me."

He pressed his forehead to hers and then his head dipped to place a kiss on her lips— desperate and hungry, worshipful and needy.

"I love you," he breathed into her mouth as he took ragged breaths.

Hermione stroked his hair with her hands. "I love you too," she said as she pulled him in for another kiss. She pulled away slightly, startling him. "But why are we in a dusty cupboard with a mirror and so many snake sculptures?"

Snape burst into almost-hysterical laughter as he swirled her around and hugged her tight. The ring was in his hand, shining like the moon in the night sky.

"Will you—"

Hermione's eyes grew wide as her face lit up like the sun. "_**Yes!**_ Severus— _**yes!**_"she cried, slamming into him as if by sheer force they could become one entity.

As they stepped out of the mirror's hidden cupboard, Lucius stood outside it, the sun framing his tall form like a halo of some wrathful archangel.

"Brother," Hermione cried joyously, running towards him.

Lucius scooped her up, crushing her to himself. "Sister," he sobbed, his silver cane crashing to the floor as he focused all his effort into his embrace. "Oh, _Merlin_—" He rocked her against him. He grabbed Severus by the wrist.

"Oh-hey what?!" Severus blurted.

"You're getting married," Lucius announced, his fingers tightening around his wrist as he yanked him close. Right _now_."

_**Crack!**_

They were gone.

"So much for that no Apparition rule," one the portraits commented.

"Not so much rules but rather guidelines," another said archly.

"Should they have really left the door to the Chamber of Secrets standing open like that?" another portrait asked idly.

As if to answer that question, the great door slowly closed by itself, transforming to look like any other broom cupboard.

"That Salazar had way too many doors to the Chamber," another portrait scolded, tutting. "How do you keep something secret if people can just randomly stumble into it, I ask you?"

"Hush," Phineas said quellingly. "Everything is just as it should be now. Let the rest go bite Albus on the arse."

"Hear, hear," another portrait agreed.

The portraits mumbled together and went back to business as usual as Phineas regally swept through their frames on his way back to his own.

Mission accomplished.

* * *

Lucius seized the Minister for Magic by the collar and unceremoniously dragged Fudge off to the Ministry wedding office— an ornate chapel nestled in the very heart of the Ministry, seemingly forgotten by many. The small arboretum within flourished with lush flowers and ornamental trees and it was kept very well-tended by a colony of fairies that busily flitted from branch to branch as they tried not to be eaten by equally enthusiastic predators.

Minerva arrived wearing elegant dress robes accented by a McGonagall tartan sash amidst a misty cloud of catnip, having used some sort of strange feline teleportation that no one else even knew existed.

Alastor arrived decked out in a kilt looking quite smug and mighty well-prepared— _some_how.

Lucius had already summoned Narcissa, who worked some sort of bridal preparation magic on Hermione using Lucius' mum's exquisite wedding robes— a gown that made Hermione look like a queen and then some. She seemed determined to make things right for Hermione, perhaps having belatedly realised the significance of Lucius' having a long lost sister that he was forced to forget against his will.

A baffled-looking Draco arrived via house-elf, having been abducted from Hogwarts for the occasion. Dobby, in his haste to obey his orders, had unfortunately dressed Draco backwards, causing Narcissa to twitch in dismay as she righted the wrongs of wedding fashion for her son.

Draco, utterly disoriented and flustered, saw Hermione's mane of curls and immediately scoffed, demanding to know why some Mudblood chit was attending a family event.

However, when Hermione stood to her full height, turning to face her doubting nephew, Draco's face managed to turn twenty shades paler than usual when his eyes took in the distinctive Malfoy features and the crackle of family magic snapped into place with a distinctive _**zap**_.

Hermione's grey eyes were tinged with gold— a mixture of cognac and moonlight— the only trace of what had once been brown. Age had taken away the bucked teeth and uncontrolled bushy mane and sculpted her features into that of a Malfoy— high cheekbones and the distinctive slanted brows. Flawless alabaster skin, seemingly untouched by the sun and the definitive trademark of the Malfoy family, made her glow ethereally.

"Tch," Hermione scolded, her delicate mouth pursed into a fine line of disapproval. "Such fine manners you have, nephew. Whatever would your father say?"

Draco's brain desperately tried to reboot and failed, doing its best simulation of the blue screen of death as his jaw dropped and his eyes attempted to jump out of his skull and flee.

Lucius' pale hand grasped his son by the back of the head and pinned Draco against the wall as he stared balefully at him. His lips curled in clear disapproval, with a fleeting flash of teeth. "I trust we will not have to have a discussion on this _again_, Draco?"

"Nu-no, f-father," Draco stammered nervously, his grey eyes going wide with fear.

As Severus swept into the room dressed in silver dragon brocade lined formal robes, Draco's mind did another flip as the elder wizard looked not a day over twenty— the worn lines of stress age having disappeared along with a number of years. His hair, impeccably tamed and fastened with a dark green ribbon and silver serpent clasp, hung down along his back.

As the couple stood together on the wedding dais, Minister Fudge appeared quite discomfited by Snape's dark scowl— something made no less intimidating by the youthful face.

"We gather here today to witness the fusing of magic between not only a wizard and a witch but two people joined with love," Fudge managed to stammer, trying not to be intimidated by his present company.

"In a world where love has not always been a requirement, finding it is perhaps the greatest treasure," Fudge continued, tugging anxiously at his collar with one finger. "We bear witness today of a union of magic and love and the promise of a bright future built together in both good times or trying times, illness or health, wartime or peace. May the bond forged today ne'er be torn asunder. May it anchor you in life and beyond to each other, that you may never be beset with loneliness."

Dobby came bouncing up with a velvet pillow with rings on it, but he tripped and the rings went flying into the air to smack Fudge in the face just before Hermione hissed, "_Immobulus!"_ and froze the rings in mid-fall.

Dobby frantically beat his head against the podium until Severus used his leg to shove Dobby away and back towards Lucius, who snatched up the errant house-elf by the pillowcase and forced him to sit down. Lucius cracked his neck as he pressed his lips together, keeping his attention steadily forward.

Fudge twitched, accepting the rings and placing them on the couples' ring fingers. The silver serpents slithered around their ring fingers, jewelled ruby and emerald eyes sparkling together. "With these rings, may your lives be forever intertwined, just as the vines upon the tree trunk. May your hearts be ever emboldened and your minds be made together. May your magic merge together and your power grow in unison that no task will ever be insurmountable in the face of your devotion to each other."

"Do you, Severus Snape, come willingly to bind yourself to this witch, Hermione Malfoy?"

"I do."

"Do you, Hermione Malfoy, come willingly to bind yourself to this wizard, Severus Snape?"

"I do."

He placed their hands together as he wrapped a delicate, ethereal ribbon around their hands and wrists. "I bind you together in this life as two halves made whole. May none attempt to break what has been willingly bound together lest magic strike the interloper down for the audacious attempt to sully the most sacred."

"I now pronounce you bound in magic and life in marriage most sacred," Fudge completed his speech and the ribbon seemed to sink into their skin and disappear.

Fudge cleared his throat. "You may kiss the bride."

Severus' dark eyes met Hermione's as his head dipped and his mouth covered hers in a passionate, heartfelt kiss.

A hot wave of magic burst from their bodies and washed over the chapel as it began to rain moonlight spiders on gossamer light silk threads.

"_Eee! A special wedding!"_

"_Yay, wedding!"_

"_We're free!"_

"_Will they want us?"_

"_We weave the best silk!"_

"_Maybe we should ask?"_

"_Maybe—"_

"_Will they take us home with them?"_

"_I hope so. This chapel is a bit overcrowded."_

One of the spiders landed on Hermione's hand and waved its leg at her. "_We need a good home. Can we go live with you?"_

Hermione tilted her head, giving Severus a shared look of unexpected curiosity. "I suppose so."

"_Yay!"_

"_Double yay!"_

"_Most excellent, yay!"_

"_Best hatching day ever!"_

"_Indeed!"_

The arachnids swarmed up to hide in her curls, making her hair sparkle like the blinking of stars.

Fudge, baffled, scratched his head. "I've never seen _that _happen before."

Severus tenderly touched his wife's cheek. "Get used to that feeling, Minister. My dear wife always champions the cause of the underestimated and unexpected."

As the couple stepped off the dais, the cheering guests surrounded them as they were swept away to the reception grounds with a simultaneous _**crack **_of Disapparation.

* * *

"This is not a "small" cottage, Lucius," Severus said as he surveyed the seaside garden that surrounded what could only be described as a grand seaside estate.

"Don't be thick, Severus," Lucius scoffed. "Of _course _it is. I will not have my precious sister living in squalor, besides— you now have a lot of moon spiders to house." His look then turned rather mischievous. "And naturally you will need plenty of space for your future children."

"My wife and I do _not _plan on repopulating the magical world single-handedly with our own genetics, Lucius," Severus protested.

"Only half," Lucius said with a straight face. "Do leave the other to our Draco's future family."

Draco's face turned beet red. "_Ew, _father. Witches are scary."

"Do give him some time, brother," Hermione said, chuckling softly. "He _is _only eleven."

Draco crossed his thin arms over his chest and stuck out his bottom lip in a pout. "Almost _twelve_."

Severus arched a brow.

Draco was still staring intently at Hermione as if trying to connect the bushy-haired Muggleborn witch with his newly discovered aunt. She possessed hints of the young girl he remembered, but the distinctive imprint of the Malfoy family was firmly demonstrated in her magical and physical DNA, and he could feel the familial connection just as assuredly as he did his mum or his father—

_Adoption? _He boggled at the notion.

He'd certainly heard of it, of course, but—what _was _the entire pureblood supremacy argument if one could choose to adopt?

He wrinkled up his face as he tried valiantly to digest the elusive epiphany.

It went about as well as fathoming how and why Severus had shed so many years off his physical age—

Not that he _still _wasn't bloody intimidating regardless of his age, oh no.

Was it simply something as seemingly small as acceptance? Being accepted or accepting another?

It went over about as well as realising that his "Uncle" Severus was actually his biological uncle, now— not that he'd ever had a problem with Severus save that one shameful incident as a younger child when his father had firmly cuffed him upside the head for daring speak to Severus in a manner quite unbefitting of a Malfoy.

He hadn't even known exactly what that meant, but he knew from that point on that talking down to the dark, lank-haired, brooding man was most emphatically unacceptable.

Only now—

He began to understand _why_.

Remembering or not, Severus had been permanently linked to the Malfoy family line through Hermione Malfoy even without being married. Hermione had trusted him, and therefore he was very important to his father. Even his oh-so-proper pureblood mother seemed to acknowledge the shift.

The truth.

It wasn't about blood at all— it was about _magic_.

Familial magic.

You either felt the tie or did not.

If you _didn't_—

Was that it? He wondered. Was it about feeling the thrum of magic in those around you— feeling that connection?

His father had said that the old families shared blood in one way or another. You could feel that distant connection despite however removed it was. Muggleborns did not have that connection— they were cut off from it— and they could create new bloodlines having never been in touch with familial magic's thrum that spanned generations.

They muddied the waters.

Mud.

_Mud-blood_.

Draco's eyes widened in shock as the revelation sank in.

Odd that he never felt the tingle of magical kinship with Potter, a supposed Pureblood family— or any of the Weasels…

Why would the Weasleys be cut off?

Draco didn't like thinking. It hurt his head. It ended in more questions he didn't have answers for.

"I wish mum and dad could see this place," Hermione said, her expression sad. "Well, the Grangers," she corrected. "I—" she looked at the portrait of her and Lucius' shared mother. "I miss our mum too."

Lucius put a hand on her shoulder, a look of tender understanding gracing his face. Draco couldn't remember last seeing his father being a sympathetic wizard. It was something new and strange to witness.

"Mother would be so glad you are safe," he said quietly. "As am I."

Hermione smiled at him, placing his hand on his and patting it. "I truly love it here, brother. Thank you so much."

Lucius shook his head. "You deserve it and more," he said. "If bricks could be a measure of my relief, it would be a hundred thousand times more."

Hermione laughed. "Please, no. I do not _need _an enormous manse."

Clutters of enthusiastic arachnids were busily making themselves at home just out of sight, declaring the home perfectly sized for their webs and varied spidery antics.

As guests filtered in, having Apparated in from the garden, Draco noticed both Crabbe and Goyle standing silently in cowed attendance to their formidable fathers. Both Crabbe and Goyle Sr placed parcels on the gifting table before approaching, practically yanking their respective sons by the collar.

"My Lady," Goyle Sr said formally, reaching out to take her hand.

Hermione placed it in his hand, and he kissed her knuckles. Crabbe Sr did the same, and they seemed quite eager to be in her company.

"Lord Goyle, Crabbe," Hermione said, giving a swift yet elegant curtsy. "How very good of you to come."

"We would never miss it," Goyle Sr said with a quick nod of his head to Crabbe Sr. "We remember clearly who rose to our defence so long ago even after our more shameful beginnings."

Hermione tilted her head. "No one deserves to be treated as scum for simply being of one house or another in a school where such things encourage misunderstanding." Her expression darkened. "Now, if someone were to try attack me personally, I would, of course, treat them in kind."

Both Goyle and Crabbe Sr smiled none to kindly, a sort of stray eagerness that whet their lips with enthusiasm. Theirs was a darker shade of grey. It had always been so— a unique balance that had been kindled by one Hermione Malfoy, who had encouraged them to become much more than what others expected of them.

Both Gregory and Vincent, however, too young and freshly minted (perhaps even a bit thick to even notice to sense the respects their fathers gave Hermione) gave Hermione a scowling, disapproving look.

Crabbe Sr jerked Vincent by the collar and pushed him forward. "My son has yet to hear the tale of how our Lady Hermione saved both myself and Conrad here from the Gryffindor gang's castration curse. Had she not done so, neither of us would have had heirs short of adoption."

Both Gregory and Vincent's eyes grew wide as reality sank in; neither of them would even have been _born _had it not been for Hermione Malfoy.

Hermione gave the wave that dismissed their accolades— the very familiar Malfoy wave. "It was nothing."

All present knew perfectly well that it was definitely more than nothing.

"I am gratified that you are no longer pining over that selfish little poser, Severus," Crabbe Sr said with a nod. "I am also glad that we are no longer oblivious to it like was expected of us."

Conrad Goyle shook his head, scowling. "We have ensured that the proper gift was given to bless your new family," he said sombrely. "It has the most appropriate gravity."

A clutter of spiders scurried by carrying setting cards for the tables.

"_Hurry up!"_

"_Place cards for everyone!" _

"_Everything have their cards?" _

"_Here we go!" _

Goyle and Crabbe Sr. raised their brows simultaneously.

"They won the house caretaker lottery," Severus said dryly. "They came with the wedding."

"Such things have not been seen in homes in quite some time. Most," Goyle said appraisingly, "have had house elves for so long that they forget the other creatures. As I understand it, house-spiders are a bit more— needy."

Hermione laughed as a spider peeked out of her hair to glare at Goyle. "Nothing _too _over the top. There are simply many more of them."

She gave the arachnid a stunned fly, and it snatched it up quickly before disappearing back into her hair.

There was an outcry from one of the guest tables as one heavily freckled ginger screamed shrilly and smashed a heavy soup bowl down on top of a card-holding spider, who was dutifully attempting to place it into the holder on the table.

Vichyssoise flew everywhere as the bone china bowl shattered, and the poor arachnid gave a startled squeak of terror before going flat in the remains of the china and soup.

Two things happened simultaneously.

Severus had seized Ronald Weasley by the collar as he glowered down at him with silent, incandescent rage, and Hermione rushed over to the damaged table. She waved her wand, cleaning up the mess and hitting the place settings with a swift _Reparo _before cradling the dutiful arachnid in her hands.

A thrum of magic connected her with Severus, and house itself seemed to echo with a heartbeat.

_**Pop! **_

A strand of energy from the core of the house hit the arachnid's body.

The spider's body pulled together with a _piffling _sound as the small arachnid looked around itself with its multiple eyes.

"_I'm okay!"_ it announced, hugging Hermione's fingers before jumping down to the table again. "_Thank you!"_ It righted the placeholder card and scurried off to the table on a strand of shining silk.

"I suppose that answers the question to whether the bond between the house and its caretakers has been appropriately cemented," Lucius said approvingly, placing a brotherly hand on Severus' shoulder.

The Dark wizard scowled, but he released the young Weasley as one would drop a bit of especially foul refuse into the rubbish bin. His nose crinkled as if the boy's very odour offended him intensely.

"I'm terribly sorry for my youngest son's poor behaviour, Lord Snape," Arthur apologised profusely, rushing up the moment his white-faced son was released from his iron grip. "Trust me, we will be having a most serious… _discussion _about this at home where it will not bring further unpleasantness to you on your most happy occasion."

Severus' lip curled in disgust, but Hermione touched his arm, gently placing her palm against the back of his hand. His expression softened and then he nodded curtly. "You are quite lucky, Mr Weasley, that my lady wife was able to restore the caretaker to rights."

"_**Wut?"**_ Ron replied in outrage, turning quite red in the face. "You're actually going to _**continue**_ this bloody farce? She's like _**twelve **_at the most! That's _**disgusting! **_Mum said you must have used an aging pot—_**MFPH!**_"

"That is quite enough, Ronald," Molly snapped, unceremoniously stuffing a homemade knitted scarf with the letter "R" emblazoned on it into his protesting mouth. Her face was even redder than her hair, and her eyes were flashing dangerously, fit to kill on sight.

She bowed. "My deepest apologies, Lady Snape. My comments were made before I regained my memories of you. Please forgive me for the shamefully erroneous presumptions I made."

Ron's eyes practically bugged out of his head as his mother— _**HIS**_ mother— then curtsied to 'Mione!

Hermione's expression was sombre. She turned to Severus, leaning slightly if not imperceptibly against him. "I find it rather disturbing just how easily I was forgotten."

"To be fair, my Lady," Goyle Sr said quietly. "Whatever happened took the memory of you from more than just a few people."

"It stole you from your family, your allies, and even those whose jealousy outweighed personal merit," Lucius agreed.

Hermione nodded, seeming quite sad. "All I wanted was to be her friend. She was important to Severus, so that made her important to me."

Severus took his wife into his arms and hugged her close. "You were important to me."

Hermione touched his cheek. "There is no shame in having cared for a friend you made before you met me, love."

Severus just shook his head. "I did not know what I had been missing until I met _you_."

"Insufferable know-it-all, is I believe what you said," she replied, chuckling.

Severus sighed. "I was equally insufferable."

Hermione smiled. "Just set in your ways."

"At _twelve_?"

"Children seem to be even more stubborn," she noted, eyes twinkling.

Severus rolled his eyes, but a smile tugged at his lips.

A belligerent Ron looked like he was about to unscarf himself and stand up, but Fred and George promptly charmed their little brother's chair to sprout a set of shackles that held tight to his arms and legs, then silently returned to eating their meal. Percy looked rather intimidated by it all and yet quite eager to start schmoozing.

Ron's brow was sweating profusely with his outraged resistance to being forcibly squelched. His magic was flaring wildly in his emotional state, and it was clear that the flare of his emotion was amplifying his magic considerably, sending tremors through the chair as the bindings cracked.

Molly and Arthur quickly tried to calm him down by dispelling the restraints, but Ron stood immediately, his face scrunched up to release his pent-up frustrations in a torrential verbal onslaught, but his magic did the talking for him, and it rose and lashed out, knocking his parents backwards.

"There's no _**way **_a stupid Muggleborn bint got cozy with all you slimy Slytherins!" he blurted.

Silverware clanked and glasses dropped as silence fell over the gathering.

Molly looked absolutely mortified, and a miserable Arthur cradled his head in his hands. Ron's older brothers, who had been politely eating their dinners and chatting quietly, stared in shock. Ginny slithered deep into her seat as if she was trying to merge herself with the floor, embarrassed beyond belief by her youngest brother's behaviour.

Fred and George grabbed Ron by the arms and unceremoniously frogmarched him out the garden door.

"We're so sorry everyone! Our Ronniekins hasn't been right in the head since he drank that cleaning potion he thought was a his favourite sweetberry soda! We're going to take him outside to walk it off a bit more, yeah?"

The guests went back to eating as a stunned Arthur helped his wife back to her seat, muttering lowly amongst themselves.

Lucius sighed. "I _do _hope the boy doesn't go wandering off into the faerie rings in the back acreage. He could end up with the head of a jackass or sporting a new fishtail."

Hermione rubbed the space between her eyes. "I remember him, that one. I— I believe he hated me because I once asked him on the Hogwarts Express if a spell he attempted to turn his familiar yellow was real."

Severus arched a dark brow. "As I recall, your reputation at Hogwarts before your epic tumble through time was not nearly as solid as what you created when you landed in _mine_."

Hermione smiled, her gaze full of adoration. "I found the love of my life. I think that worked out quite well, don't you?"

Severus' gaze softened, and he brushed his thumb against her cheek before putting on an official face. "Thank you all for joining us today and helping us celebrating a wedding that should have happened more than a dozen years ago. While we all have our speculations as to who orchestrated the chain of events that led to my wife's erasure from our memories, I am happy to say that she is now back in our minds and hearts, here in our lives again. Please enjoy your dinner and drinks, and should you need anything, please feel free to state your requests to any nearby spiderweb."

The gathered clinked their silverware against the crystalware gently in appreciation.

Severus took in a deep breath and gave his wife a tender look before dipping his head down to kiss Hermione in a chaste but loving touch of lips.

The guests resumed their chatter, happily enjoying their gourmet meals.

"Lucius," Severus said. "How many restaurants did you shut down to devise such a large offering? Surely not all the house-elves in the manor were ready for this event?"

Lucius' lips quirked in open amusement. "Enough."

"Hn," Severus replied, clearly unconvinced.

A shrill scream came from outside the doors leading to the back garden, and all of the guests scrambled frantically for their wands, shoving their children behind them into a protected area as they rushed outside—

… only to find an extensive gaggle of Death Eaters in full regalia having apparently tripped over one terrified and screaming Ronald B. Weasley and landed in the faerie rings. Their heads, arms, feet, rear ends, and various other appendages had been transformed into miscellaneous random beast parts belonging from creatures varying from fish to fowl.

One oddly reptilian-looking scale-covered orange-red chicken creature lay pass out flat and seeming stunned in the main faerie ring.

_**Brrrk.**_

_**Brrrrk.**_

_**Bukack!**_

It then laid a golden snitch that promptly flew off, smashed headlong into a window pane, wobbled, and deposited a rich chocolate bonbon on the sill.

Fred and George, who had been unceremoniously dumped over the side of the shorter of the two garden walls by their escaping brother, peeked over the stone edge and looked around rather blearily. The brushed the dirt and vines off their faces as their eyes grew wide.

"Wicked!' they chimed together, grinning from ear-to-ear.

_**BuKACK! **_

The orange almost-but-not-quite chicken squawked and laid another golden snitch.

At that very moment, all the Death Eaters spontaneously transformed into a flock of black-scaled almost-chickens who then proceeded to lay an astonishing number of multicoloured metallic eggs.

Lucius picked up one very cautiously, taking care not to step near the faerie rings. He tapped the shell with a manicured finger and it cracked neatly open exposing a decadent-looking chocolate truffle.

One hen, who sported a bushy pom-pom of curly black and white tail feathers, ran around frantically, flapping her wings as she tried to attack Lucius' legs.

Lucius, lips curled into a humourless smirk, said, "Well hello there, my dear sister-in-law."

_**BuKAK! BuKAK! **_

The hen tried again to attack him, but her bill was gummy and harmless and her claws made sickeningly cute squeaking noises instead of tearing apart his fine silk robes. She left a trail of pastel foil-wrapped eggs in her wake.

Lucius pointed his wand at the ginger un-hen and levitated it over to Molly Weasley. "Congratulations, Madam Weasley. I believe you may have just acquired the start of a unique and lucrative business in chocolate eggs."

Alastor Moody smirked and sipped his drink as he leaned up against the taller garden wall. "Well, I haven't had _this _much fun at a wedding reception in quite a long time. That's the problem with faerie rings. The magic tends to be notoriously random." He moved his wand around scanning the squawking not-chickens. "Whatever blast of accidental wandless magic young Ronald emitted while he was running around here like a lunatic, it seems to have combined with the faerie magick and created—"

"Whatever the cluck this is," Severus said, utterly deadpan.

"_**BuKACK!"**_ the un-chickens squawked together, laying another large clutch of chocolate eggs.

Crabbe and Goyle Sr shook their heads in bemusement at the transformed former brethren they had left behind in order to attend the Snape wedding.

"Bellatrix never could resist an opportunity to ruin a happy event," Narcissa mused, tilting her head up. "Oddly, seeing her transformed into an almost-chicken seems strangely fitting somehow. Though I am not quite sure how she managed to find this place as even _**I**_ did not know of it until Lucius remembered enough to tell me."

"Familial magic," Hermione said sadly. "She'll always know where her sister is."

Narcissa closed her eyes and sighed deeply. "She was a kind witch once, but she truly adored our father. He… ruined her. He showed her things no child should ever see. She was never quite right again."

She stood a little closer to Lucius, taking comfort from his presence without touching. She'd never been comfortable with closeness that actually touched, and that she blamed on her father too. She'd often wondered after Lucius shared his memories of Hermione's feats—if Hermione had learned about it as she had with Lucius' father if _her _father would have suffered some sort of epic magical mishap and found himself frantically swimming the seas to avoid being eaten by a hungry seal, penguin, otter, or worse.

She had a feeling that the reason her sister Andromeda preferred to marry a Muggleborn and forsake the familial bond of magic was because of their twisted monster of a father.

No, she found that she couldn't really blame Andromeda at _all_.

Maybe now, she thought. Maybe they could finally reconnect again.

Maybe she would like their former sister, Bella the dysfunctional un-chicken, as a belated wedding gift.

Narcissa smiled as Aurors poured in as they responded to the call from Alastor Moody. The baffled Aurors rounded up the almost-chickens while trying not to step, fall in, or otherwise end up in the faerie circles.

"So, brother," Lucius said, purring.

Severus arched a brow. "Yes, Lucius?"

"Fancy a nice chicken dinner?"

Severus' smirk in response was decidedly wicked.

* * *

**End of Chapter One**

* * *

**A/N:** I know some of you would prefer updates on Born Unto Darkness or another of the longer epic stories, but my schedule makes it really hard to focus on the longer stories right now. I'm not abandoning them, I just need a good jolt of inspiration to continue the pacing. This story was meant to be a one shot, but it got away with me as more and more details filled in.

Thank you for the support you've given me in the reviews you have given. I read each and every one, even if I don't have time to reply to all of them. Thank you very much for taking the time to review. It means a lot to me after coming home from 12 hour shifts and seeing your comments.

Thanks also to my lovely beta, Dragon and the Rose, who tolerates my addle-brained easily distra(SQUIRREL) train of thoughts, and Dutchgirl01 who somehow makes time with a schedule worse than mine.

Back to work tomorrow. Cry.


	2. Chapter 2: Conclusion

**Summary: ** [HG/SS] AU/Crackfic. Neville created something borderline genius in potions class that changes the very course of history—literally.

**A/N:** Ghghfkdhffffbzzt! (No, _really_)

**Beta Love:** The Dragon and the Rose, Dutchgirl01, and Flyby Commander Shepard

* * *

**Avoidance**

**Chapter Two**

"_I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. _

_I want to achieve it through not dying." _

**Woody Allen**

* * *

"Mr Weasley, I am quite certain that there is nothing related to your current situation that will be solved by staring at my _wife_."

Ronald startled, flushing beet red and turnip purple before settling with a shade reminiscent of boiled lobster. For a chocolate bon-bon snitch-laying hen, it was mighty impressive.

"Are you absolutely sure that there is nothing you can do for him?" Molly fretted, wringing her hands.

"By all means," Severus drawled, "do feel free to pluck him and find out."

The Ronald-unchicken squawked in terror, bolting for the garden gate only to get his pudgy body stuck, wedged firmly between the wrought iron bars.

Molly promptly went chasing after her chickified son, calling his name frantically with her apron strings flapping madly behind her.

Arthur sighed, rubbing the space between his eyes as if attempting to head off a nasty migraine. "I feel like we completely failed our Ronald somehow. Maybe all that working didn't give me enough time to sort him out properly."

"I doubt if anyone could have ever predicted a chickenification via faerie rings, Arthur," Hermione said kindly, passing him an iced lemonade.

Severus mumbled something about Sybill sodding Trelawney under his breath, causing Hermione to surreptitiously kick him in the shins while Arthur stared at his wife chasing the un-chicken running in circles around the vegetable garden.

The Death Eater un-chickens had all been rounded up by Unspeakables and taken to the Department of Mysteries to be thoroughly examined— _again_.

Ronald, however, had been fully examined multiple times only to confirm that he was going to be living a rooster's or rather a hen's life laying bonbon filled snitches for, well, the rest of his life.

Truthfully, no one in the Ministry could seem to figure out if he was really a rooster or a hen, as chocolate egg-laying un-chickens hadn't ever been a "real" thing until that very moment.

Molly was still quite distraught at the loss of her son's status as a human wizard, but his decadent chocolate-filled golden snitches were already in high demand— the money not exactly being unwelcome to keep the rest of the family well cared for. For the first time ever, the Weasley children wouldn't be forced to get secondhand books and robes for school and that was admittedly a change for the better.

The good of the many, as they say—

Arthur was suddenly finding that he didn't have to work every last bit of overtime he could muster anymore, and he was able to spend much more time with his wife and children. The previous lack of which he had argued was a major factor in what had gone wrong with their Ronald's upbringing.

He also had to placate Molly after they found out the exceedingly long reach of the man who'd managed to erase the memory of Hermione Malfoy from the face of Creation, even if but for two decades. The DoM had realised, after confirming the existence of the Mirror of Erised, that having placed her inside an artefact that could see one's greatest desires, it also had the power to hide whatever was placed within it from any and everyone at least until some condition had been met.

It had included Albus Dumbledore himself.

What had broken the geas over Hermione Malfoy's stasis had been his ill-advised attempt to hide the Sorcerer's Stone within the very same mirror. Between the two meeting together, the memory of her that was held inside had escaped to the outside world, allowing Severus to pull her back out into the physical plane.

What that meant for Severus and Hermione Snape, having been intimately involved with the magical influence of the Sorcerer's Stone, was yet to be determined. Already, Severus had been restored to his youthful self, just as Hermione remembered him, and it had given Hermione back to Severus just as he remembered her.

Few could deny that the coincidence was a little _too _fitting.

But, what of Dumbledore?

He'd obviously buggered up his own memory by sealing Hermione in the mirror to begin with, and that had included the specifics of how he'd managed to do it as well as why he'd done it over letting her rot in Azkaban, as he had led Severus to believe before he'd time-sealed his memories with the help of Ministry Obliviators—

What had really happened was on more than a few minds, frustrating a great number of individuals.

Even Veritaserum couldn't help them there. Albus no longer knew the truth to tell it.

Some suspected that the reason Albus believed himself so innocent was that he purposely cast certain things into the Mirror, but others believed he kept doing it by accident and happenstance, doomed never to remember what he did and to repeat it on some other event yet to happen.

Punishment, however, seemed terribly unclear.

Perhaps, even more so when Molly Weasley attempted to take Ronald-the-Snitch-covered-bonbon-laying-hen to Dumbledore to beg him in a last-ditch effort to make things right again—

Many believed she was mad considering that she was trying to cure the very fountain of her new family cash chicken, including her other children.

She'd been offered millions of galleons for Ron-the-hen, but she wasn't all that keen to sell her son off for a pile of gold, even if said son was making her quite a lot of money.

Fred, George, and Percy vociferously disagreed with that, much to Molly's utter mortification.

But, when Dumbledore proved unable to dispel the faerie ring transformation (as part of an agreement to lessen his future sentence) he earned himself a fine set of ass ears and a matching tail for his efforts.

At that point, Molly finally began to realise that there was no ending for Ron that wouldn't result in a lifetime of chicken-dom.

And when an opportunistic fox absconded with Ron the unchicken, darting halfway across St Ottery Catchpole before Molly could stop it with a panicked spell—

The poor vulpine was atomised, leaving Ron-the-hen's feathers covered in a thick layer of bloody fox particles. The un-chicken then proceeded to lay about three dozen golden snitches in rapid succession before passing out in total exhaustion.

Molly wouldn't leave Ron alone after that, even taking him with her to the shower or wherever else she happened to be, lest he be attacked again.

So, Bill, albeit somewhat reluctantly, armed the Burrow with so many powerful new protective wards that no one and nothing that wasn't a Weasley family member could enter or leave the property without their express permission—

That and poor Xenophilius Lovegood had set off the screeching alarms and flashing coloured lights that terrified their Muggle neighbours resulting in reporters and news crews combing the fields surrounding the Burrow in search of alien invaders—

They'd found some poor Muggle bloke named Dave wandering aimlessly through the fields in hopes of seeing the aliens close up and personal which resulted in him being Obliviated after he'd witnessed them casting spells in order to make Ron a secure place to live that didn't involve being constantly carried around by his anxious mum—

Of course, the poor sod being found drooling profusely on a London park bench with no memory of how he got there only further fueled the man's alien obsession and he soon gathered quite an online following after sharing his epic tale of how he was "abducted by a ship filled with face-hugger aliens" that "conducted strange experiments upon his person" and then "brainwashed him."

It was and continued to be a royal sodding mess, but at least Ron was now "happily" housed in an expansive luxe coop that could accommodate his frantic and apparently quite random snitch-laying needs.

He had a lot of company, too.

About a round dozen feathered chocolate-laying ex-Death Eaters, to be exact.

All of them judged permanently cursed.

Oddly, only Ronald seemed to retain some memory of who he was, but only when he was fed corn. It wore off after a few minutes.

Arthur sighed. "Sorry to bring you all the way out here for nothing, Severus, Hermione," he said sadly. "You both know how my Molly is. She won't rest or let anyone else do so if she thinks there is even the slightest chance of restoring Ron back to the boy he was. Even after the entire Department of Mysteries and a whole sea of Unspeakables told her there wasn't a thing anyone could do to counter fae magic."

Severus curled his lip, but then he waved Arthur off, dismissing the elder wizard's apology.

Hermione shook her head. "It's all right, Arthur. I feel like I missed out on so much while I was sealed away. Charlie off to Romania already, Bill out there curse-breaking for Gringotts— seems like only yesterday that the twins were about knee high and trying to pull the curtains down upon you."

"They're _still _trying that," Arthur confessed with a weary shrug.

"Why not take that trip to see Bill in Egypt?" Hermione asked. "I'm sure Xenophilius would love to watch over the hens while you're away."

Arthur seemed to chew on that idea for a while. "Maybe it _would _be good to take a bit of a holiday."

"Or I could brew you a potion to turn your twin sons into houseplants for a week," Severus said, his dour expression completely devoid of humour. "It would be no trouble and neither would they."

Hermione gave Severus an amused but rather tired look. "Besides, Hogwarts is shut down for the week while the Aurors are scouring the castle looking for any evidence of the old Headmaster's criminal activities, so it'd be a perfect time."

Arthur rubbed the back of his neck thoughtfully. "True. Not like this happens all that often if ever— and I've always wanted to see Egypt." He brightened greatly. "Thanks, Hermione. I think I'm going to go and have a talk with Xenophilius."

He trudged off as Hermione and Severus exchanged looks.

"Good thing we were standing outside the wards," Hermione said with a frown. "Being trapped in the Burrow is _not _my idea of a fun day out."

Severus shuddered at that rather unwelcome prospect. "Can we go home now?"

Hermione smiled warmly. "Of course, love."

Severus extended his hand, and she placed hers in it.

_**Crack!**_

They were gone.

* * *

"My Lady, we found this, erm… _thing _laying fudge-filled eggs in the old Riddle Mansion in Little Hangleton," Crabbe Sr said, making a face.

Goyle Sr shook his head. "I'm no magizoologist, but I'm pretty sure that is— was— maybe still is the Dark Lord."

They all stared at the large metallic green un-chicken with bright red eyes and a crimson gummy beak. Everytime it looked like it was gearing up to attack, it would cluck madly and lay an enormous fudge egg with a vibrant green candy shell.

Alastor Moody was laughing his arse off, cackling so hard he was wheezing.

Nearby Amelia Bones scratched her head as she and Kingsley Shacklebolt discussed the finer points of weirdness afflicting certain Dark wizards lately.

"Why didn't it affect you?" Alastor finally wheezed. "I mean, you weren't exactly champions of the light until fairly recently."

Crabbe, Goyle, Lucius, and Severus just shrugged together. "Our hearts were never really into it," Lucius explained. "With the return of my sister and those old memories, we remembered our oath to her."

Moody sobered a bit. "Oath?"

"She made us all swear not to follow— _ahem_— 'that psychopathic madman who in all likelihood isn't a pureblood wizard any more than your preening white peacocks'."

Moody sputtered and then started laughing again.

"Needless to say, we forgot our oath when we forgot our beloved Lady Malfoy," Crabbe said, annoyed. Goyle nodded ruefully as well.

"There were a few who never liked Lady Malfoy back when we were in school. Bellatrix believed she was an interloper. A pretender. Sirius Black believed her to be Morgana incarnate."

Severus sniffed. "She may be. _I_ find that rather attractive."

"Severus!" Hermione huffed, crossing her arms against her chest.

The men-folk chuckled knowingly in approval while Hermione flushed a delicate shade of pink.

Amelia shrugged. "I think we may have the world's only immortal fudge-laying chicken."

"How do you know it's immortal?"

"He tried to fling himself into Muggle traffic and—" Goyle started.

"Bounced," Crabbe finished. "He tried to step in front of a stray Avada in a Knockturn Alley duel, and the spell bounced off his shiny coating and killed the two wizards that were fighting over a— well, you get the general idea."

Hermione eyed the metallic green unchicken and sighed. "Fae magic just keeps right on giving, doesn't it?"

Alastor was losing his marbles on them all over again. Even Severus had a decidedly wicked grin on his face.

"I think that the Dark Lord has been sufficiently— neutered," Moody finally choked out after he caught his breath. "If I hadn't seen the magical scans from the DoM, I would never have believed it."

"Effectively immortal— but cursed for as long as he remains alive," Amelia said. "Can't say I really pity him."

_**BUKACK!**_

The Volde-chicken promptly laid an emu-sized fudge egg.

"That looked pretty painful," Hermione remarked.

The Volde-chicken gave her a death glare, shuddered, and then laid another enormous fudge egg. He drooped over, panting in obvious exhaustion.

"That one looked even worse," Crabbe commented with no little amusement.

"Well, Master Morgan _did _say we needed to find new sources of income for our many projects," Amelia said with a cheeky smirk. "He may not have meant an un-chicken fudge business, but I'll roll with it."

"You won't even need to compete with the Weasley family's regular chocolate egg business," Hermione pointed out optimistically.

"Well, at least we have all the time we need to find whatever things he was using to extend his life," Alastor said. "I'm betting it's some sort of phylactery or a Horcrux perhaps."

"Darkest of magic that," Goyle said, nodding in agreement. "It shouldn't be too difficult to do since the source is right here." He pointed to the un-chicken with his thumb.

Volde-chicken tried desperately to maul Goyle's dragonhide boots, but only managed to make insufferably cute squeaking noises.

"Is that a tracking bracelet on his ankle?"

Moody grunted. "Indeed. Wouldn't want him to escape and leave a fudgy mess everywhere."

Severus snorted. "The _horror_."

"Do you think there are others out there that were— chickened?" Hermione asked, frowning slightly.

"I think there is a very good likelihood that those who fully embraced his vision have not been unaffected." Amelia scratched her ear and sighed. "We may find ourselves hunting down un-chickens for a year or so, just to make sure there aren't any others slipping through the cracks. Thankfully, the Mark is all we need to get a sample of the magic to track any residuals down."

"Beware of fae magick," Severus said. "If this isn't a perfect case study, I don't know what is."

Moody sniffed. "Now all that remains is Dumbledore's trial— I doubt it will be all that pretty."

Everyone frowned together.

"I take it that it would be too much to ask for Albus to have tripped into a random faerie ring?" Lucius asked.

Amelia snorted. "I'd really like to see that."

"I suppose we should go to the trial, seeing is I have to testify," Hermione said sadly.

Severus put a hand on her shoulder, and she smiled at him.

"I'm ready," Hermione said. "I've had a decade without you I've missed to empower me."

Severus nodded, and they all left for the Wizengamot together— with the green un-chicken in tow.

* * *

_**The Eclectic Hen Opens in the Ministry**_

_Come one! Come All! Visit the Eclectic Hen Shoppe in the Ministry of Magic where all sorts of hen-themed candy is available for sale. Quidditch themes and more await you, including the Snitchy Truffles from none other than the Madam Molly's Chickolates, the decadent Dark as a Dark Lord fudge eggs from the Department of Mysteries' secret recipe, and the effervescent lemon sherbet eggs from the eclectic hen herself!_

_(shows moving picture of pristine white hen with a grey waddle and ice blue eyes sitting on an impressive pile of lemon sherbet eggs)_

_Many have debated on where these magical hens have come from, but so far it has been anyone's guess. Some say that Madam Weasley has been cooking up her special recipes for years and her twin sons invented a way to feed normal hens and turn them into chocolate layers. No one really seems to know for sure._

_Regardless of how these delights came to be, come and visit the Eclectic Hen from 8am to 5pm in the main Ministry courtyard!_

* * *

"You expect _**me **_to believe that Fawkes abducted Albus and dropped him into a faerie ring?" Dolores Umbridge screeched. "_**Impossible!**_ There is no such _**thing!**_"

Hermione tilted her head up in a distinctively Malfoy way. Her lips pursed together. "By all means, Madam. _Do _feel free to go see for yourself and prove me wrong." She gestured invitingly to the back garden.

Umbridge stalked up to Hermione and got right up in her face. "I'll _**prove **_that you're nothing more than a little social-climbing Mudblood imposter and that this entire _**ridiculous **_story is just a shoddy attempt to put good people like Minister Fudge in a bad light!"

Hermione arched a brow looking very much like her husband. Her lips tightened. "As I said, do feel free to prove me wrong, Madam Undersecretary," Hermione said. "But should you fail in your endeavour, all of your assets shall become _my _assets by the letter of pureblood law— just as you signed it, Madam."

Umbridge's face scrunched up hatefully as she fisted her wand tightly. "I'll prove you _**wrong**_, missy. Just you wait and watch a _**real **_pureblood witch in action."

Hermione's grey eyes seemed ever colder. "I eagerly await your demonstration."

Umbridge stormed off into the back garden and had hardly walked five steps in when she tripped, sending a multitude of tiny mushrooms flying into the air as her body landed face first—

_**BUKACCCKKKK!**_

Lucius strolled up and handed his sister an iced limeade. "Sister."

"Thank you, brother."

"Do I even want to know?"

"We had unexpected company, Lucius. They insisted upon seeing our back garden saying that Albus could not _possibly _have been dropped into a faerie ring by a flaming, flying rooster."

Fawkes, who was happily eating his favourite gooseberries off one of the loaded garden bushes, spit a beakful of tiny seeds out at the pink hen in the back garden.

The hen then squawked and laid a glittery bright pink egg. It rolled into a rock, split open, and tiny white candy kittens came pouring out along with a pink-tinted chocolate creme, mewling sweetly and generally carrying on.

"I believe we owe that flaming feather duster an exotic fruit basket," Severus said, walking over carrying his own tall glass of limeade. "We should probably also block off this side of the garden until the fungus season simmers down somewhat."

Lucius sniffed. "You _could _just leave it as an additional property defence system," Lucius said.

_**BUKACCKKKKK!**_

The trio turned to see a lime-green hen with distinctive red spectacle markings attacking the pink one for the best feeding area, then stopping to lay a glossy red egg that promptly exploded, sending spicy cinnamon redhots flying in all directions

"I rest my case," Lucius said rather smugly.

Severus' expression was nothing short of wicked. "Excellent."

Hermione just sipped her drink, hiding her giggle behind her glass.

Lucius raised a glass to the lime-green hen. "That's what you get for trying to sneak onto a Malfoy's property uninvited, my dear."

* * *

_**Time passes...**_

* * *

Pansy was ecstatic that she was finally getting somewhere with Draco Malfoy. It seemed like forever that she'd been waiting for him to so much as give her the time of day ever since that aunt of his just appeared out of nowhere.

Ever since _she _had come back to the family, all of the perks they used to enjoy in Slytherin were no longer guaranteed.

Snape now distributed punishment equally, regardless of house.

It was completely uncalled for.

Finally, Draco was seeing the light and bringing her to one of his family events.

Finally she was going to get the recognition she deserved!

"We are gathered today to celebrate the christening of Heath and Sylvia Snape, son and daughter of Severus and Hermione Snape, here under the blessings of the gods and the old ways," a low, rumbling voice said.

_**OH WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?!**_

Pansy stifled a shriek as a large beast-man that seemed like a dragon had mated with a bat and had a freakish child cradled the babes in a wing and gently dipped them into the sacred water, using its wing thumb to trace runes on the babies' heads.

"Come celebrate with us, under the blessings of Merlin, of magic, and of life that these children will forever be under the care of magic's greatest joy, that they will know each other through the bonds they share as brother and sister, with their parents, their extended family, and to all others who have shared in magic's greatest blessings."

The beast sprinkled water on the babies and they sneezed rainbows, causing the gathered to chuckle in approval.

"Should the love of their parents be taken prematurely, who stands to care for them should it be required?"

"We shall," Narcissa and Lucius replied together.

The beast-man sprinkled water on their foreheads as well.

He held the babies up to the sunbeam. "I present to you, Heath and Sylvia Snape. May their magic never falter. May their family never fade."

A great cheering went up, and Pansy fled out the door just as fast as she could.

The Malfoys were hosting freaks!

_**Freaks!**_

She ran and ran and ran, not caring where—

_**THUMP!**_

She suddenly found herself entangled in vines and pressed up against one of the stone walls by the garden gate— the gate so tantalizingly close but not quite close enough.

A gathering of honking daffodils, fanged geraniums and facehugger morning glories turned to regard her, their petals rustling in annoyance.

_Puttputtputtputtputtputtputtttt!_

The daffodils honked loudly like a flock of angry geese, the fanged geraniums spat their sharp teeth out at her like a machine gun and the morning glories wrapped her up in their vines and dusted her liberally with bright yellow and white pollen.

Guests would comment later that they weren't quite sure what alerted them first— the sneezing fits or the screaming.

Pansy was reduced to a low whimpering for most of her life after that, running away from Draco like he was the devil himself.

Draco would comment at his wedding to Astoria Greengrass some eight years later that honking daffodils, fanged geraniums and face-hugging morning glories were his favourite flowers _ever _since they'd found Pansy with her hands clamped over her ears, strung up like a snared pheasant, her body coated in a thick layer of pollen, and her face peppered in fanged geranium teeth.

Astoria, very wisely, always treated the garden plants with extra respect as well as the House of Snape, which had ever been a great ally to their family since well before she had been born.

Severus Snape became one of the most well-known Defence Against the Dark Arts teachers Hogwarts had ever known, and it was said that every year, almost on the dot to when contracts were resigned, a random unnaturally coloured hen would appear in the DADA classroom, smack in the middle of the platform.

No one knew _why_— and they'd stopped asking anymore.

Hermione Snape became a Transfiguration teacher of considerable renown, specialising in complex human transfiguration and reversions as well as one of the foremost researchers on the effects of fae magick-induced transfiguration. She was highly respected, just as much as her husband, and Headmistress McGonagall often said Hogwarts was a better place with them teaching there. Alastor, who had continued rounding out her training upon her return, "rented her out" on weekends for highly-classified missions when things went pear-shaped somewhere else in the Ministry.

Quirinus Quirrell, whom Severus had replaced, had his own issues with eggs— which seemed to somehow be leaking out of his turban. After being found unconscious and buried alive in candy eggs, Poppy finally unwrapped his turban to find that the stuttering wizard had sprouted a hen's rear end on the back of his head—

Quirrell went completely barmy after that, babbling things about Dark Lords and fancying his eggs sunny side up. He was admitted to the Janus Thickey ward at Mungo's where he remained an inpatient until the end of his days.

The staff and patients there seemed to really appreciate the free candy eggs.

Harry, lacking his ginger-haired cohort-in-slackery and help from random others, was forced to become a good student. He studied hard, only punched Draco Malfoy _twice_, and stopped staring at Hermione Malfoy like she was an alien mutant with two heads by his third year. Only a couple years after graduating Hogwarts, Harry had managed to become a top Auror, and many said that they'd never seen someone work so hard to succeed.

Severus admitted, if not to Harry's face (ever), that Harry had successfully surpassed his father and had at last become a "passable person."

Dumbledore was thought to have escaped to some island somewhere far away from Britain, but few knew the truth that he was supplying lemon sherbet eggs to the Ministry's shop. He was, much to Moody's amusement, funding quite a few scholarships and internships at the Ministry and filling it with bright, open minds to replace the likes of Dolores Umbridge.

No one seemed to notice Umbridge was even missing.

Her pastel kitten plates were auctioned off for charity to fund a wizarding orphanage. Minister Fudge said "Dolores _loved _helping children. She would have certainly approved."

The _Daily Prophet_ gained considerably more popularity after Rita Skeeter disappeared. The rumours and speculation regarding their gossip columnist's mysterious disappearance funded the paper for many years before they made a decision to report primarily positive news after the war's end made stories featuring negative news far less popular.

The war wasn't officially over until just before the end of 2000. Quietly and under the radar, the Unspeakables of the DoM had worked closely with the Aurors to bring the Horcruxes together and destroy the lot with fiendfyre.

Wizarding Britain went on.

The DoM and the DMLE gave a huge sigh of relief.

Minister Fudge always believed there had never been anything amiss. Those who knew better simply shook their heads and let him believe it.

The world was finally safe, and that was good enough.

But for a family that spent three fourths of their time at Hogwarts and the rest in their "small" cottage by the sea, everything was as it should be.

Relatives and close friends visited on Sundays for excellent tea, biscuits, and sympathy.

Minerva visited on Friday nights (to be a feline pest, in Severus' opinion.)

Quiet nights in the library were cherished as much as the sound of children giggling in their rooms, but nothing was as profound to Severus Snape as the witch in his arms every night from the day he had pulled her from the Mirror of Erised.

They hung Phineas Nigellus Black's portrait in their children's rooms to let the old wizard enjoy his great-great-grandchildren.

It was the one portrait in the house that the children never painted a moustache or smeared grape jelly on during their flaming youth. Whether it was pure luck or the meticulous tending of their hyper-vigilant house-spiders, no one really knew for sure.

No elf _dared _try and sneak in to offer their services to the Snape family— all that did turned up some days later, having been bound head-to-toe in a thick silk cocoon with an apple stuffed in their mouth.

When their children graduated and left for parts abroad, they always knew that their parents dearly loved both them and each other.

Always.

* * *

**Fin.**

* * *

A/N: Hope you enjoyed the story! Please thank The Dragon and the Rose for staying up past her expiry date to beta this story. *yawn* Oh noes… *thud* _zzzz_


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